Tucson, Day 3

 Don't ask me what we did yesterday....

Um, Mom and I worked on a lap blanket

(knit) for the local hospice center.

And we went to Kurt and Michelle's 

for pizza dinner.

And we checked out Rozann and Greg's 

fantastic new master bedroom

(in progress...)

And we did a LOT of visiting.

Today we got Soni on her zoom conference

and then went over to Nancy's for a bit.

Then over town to see Michelle's new

(hopefully) location for her little store,

and then had a wonderful lunch at a 

cafe across the street.

Then over to Mom and Dad's.

Soni stayed and visited with Dad and Mom

and I went to the grocery store to get some

groceries, and then we came home and 

we three women sat on the couch and looked

at old photo albums from when they were first

married and the births of all 5 kids.

We were CUTE!

(hahahaha)

And then it was back over to Nancy's for a 

wonderful spaghetti dinner (Mom),

green salad (Mom & Nancy)

a big bowl of fresh fruit salad (Rozann & Greg)

and a banana cream pie. (Mom)

Soni and I were supposed to make the salad,

but when we got to the casita Soni needed

to make a phone call and I took a short break

and did some Zoom work with a couple of 

students. (what vacation? lol)

Tucson Day 1 - The Adventure Begins

 The day started EARLY.

My alarm went off at 6.

And considering I generally get up at 8-ish,

that is considered early.

(Stay tuned… this is a vacation FULL of

early mornings…)

Kyle drove me uneventfully to the airport.

We got there nice and early - 8:15 for

my 11:30 flight.

Just as I was standing in the line at TSA I

got a notification that my flight was bumped

to 2:00 pm to Dallas.

Which means I miss my connecting flight.

Honestly, I pulled out my phone and checked out

flights with SouthWest. I could MAYBE make

one at 9:50, but it was a gamble.

So I stayed in line and once through TSA

(Not my best performance, forgot my phone

was in my back pocket…)

I headed to Special Services, where she got me on

my FIRST ever Stand-by flight.

I’ve never done that before!

It was exciting!

I sat next to a man who helped me with my bag

(I usually put it under the seat, but there was

room in the overhead bin, so why not…)

And then he immediately put his chin on his chest

and spent the majority of the flight sleeping.

I caught a quick nap and then read a book.

(Middle seat)

Landed in Dallas ahead of schedule and proceeded

to gate B5. And then was looking for some lunch

when I got a notification that my gate changed to D31.

Found the Skyline and headed to terminal D.

Found a McDonalds (another first - I haven’t eaten

McD in over 2 years! Used to eat breakfast there

on my way to school back when I was teaching live…)

It’s just like I remembered. But filling.

And here I sit, waiting for my flight to leave in about an hour.

So that’s the latest…

Stay tuned!

Getting Excited!

 I'm getting excited!

Getting ready for my annual trip to see the Fam!

Ok, I haven't ACTUALLY packed yet...

But I did the laundry,

and I'm THINKING about what to pack...

And I'm cooking food for Rod and Kyle while I'm gone...

So there's that.

I have a gazillion things to do today.

Gotta run to the post office

and then to the grocery store for

a couple of last minute things.

And then... oh yah, PACK.

Also transplant some okra plants in the garden.

And I'm sure there is other stuff

I'm forgetting...

But that's the main things.

I colored my hair yesterday.

I'd like a trim, but that will have to wait.

I paid all the bills this morning,

and I'm getting my work stuff organized.

OH YEAH, I'm supposed to go to the office

and submit a couple of reports

as well as my time sheet.

Anyhow.

Counting the hours!

Saturday!!!

 The guys are off to a job.

And an estimate for another one.

I'm getting ready to start my morning zoom.

Beau is sitting in his chair getting ready for a snooze,

The horses are still in the barn.

(But I'll turn them out in a minute)

The dogs are in their yard.

There is quinoa in the pressure cooker

getting ready for my breakfast.

All is right with the world.

Never a Dull Moment

 Yesterday after teaching, we took Beau to the vet.

The tranquilizer didn't work.

And his ears aren't getting better.

So they put some "gel" antibiotic in his ears

and gave me a prescription for Ace (horse tranquilizer)

for our next visit.

Which will be while I'm out of town.

So Kyle gets to go it alone...

When we got home we dropped the dog off

and then went to Lowe's to get some stuff

to fix the door handle on Kyle's car.

On the way home Coach Rosalie texted she

was having trouble with her Zoom again,

but by the time I got to the house and on the

computer, she seemed to be fine.

About 7:45 while we were waiting for the horses to eat their

dinner, we were watch TV in the living room and

I heard a man's voice say "Hi".

We both thought it was Rod.

Weird he came home early and

didn't just come in the house.

Turns out it was a neighbor, Fred, 

who lives down the road. 

He was standing outside the front (screen) door.

Kyle worked for them feeding and mucking

and doing general barn yard stuff back when he was

in home school / high school. (14 years ago...)

He wanted to know if we knew anybody with a

backhoe, one of his boarder's horses just died and

they needed to bury it.

We don't have a backhoe, but Kyle is pretty amazing

at making his Cat do stuff it wasn't designed for.

So he swapped out his mulcher head for some forks

and a bucket and we headed down there.

In the dark.

He dug the hole and I managed the sad people.

Once the hole was dug I told everyone to say their

final goodbyes and head back up to the barn.

NOBODY needs to see their horse being dragged

to a hole. And of course, once we got it in the hole

it landed on its back with all 4 feet sticking straight

up in the air. Had to figure out a way to roll it 

over - while it is in the bottom of a deep hole

that is filling with water.

(Welcome to Florida!)

But we got it done, Kyle got the hole all 

filled in again and smoothed out.

And the young son of the sad lady planted

a flower in the dirt.

And then the skies opened up and it poured rain.

Fred was very appreciative and wants to talk

to Kyle about some clearing / mulching he needs

done on the back of his property.

So that was good.

And we were able to help a neighbor in need.

And that's always good.

No pictures.

You're welcome.

Again.

Gratuitous picture from the rodeo cuz there has to be SOMETHING...

and it was KIND of like a rodeo.....

Keeping Busy

 Yesterday Kyle put down some fertilizer

on the pastures for us.

We have closed them up until after it rains.

In the meantime, we have LOTS of hay.

(And only little tiny bits of winter grass...)

It's supposed to rain tomorrow.

Although I'm looking out my

Zoom Room window (just ended class)

and the wind is WHIPPING!

But the sun is shining... so maybe it

will hold off until tomorrow.

Meanwhile.

We are going to give Beau a little

tranquilizer pill (after his bath)

and take him to the vet for his final (hopefully)

ear infection follow up.

Last week he tried to bite everybody.

So this week he gets to be sleepy.

(And Kyle is coming too...)

Anyhow.

That's what's on tap for today.

Plus thinking about packing.

Although it's early for me....

Lunch.

(Not really, but its sitting here on my desk,

looking pretty tasty!)

I'm going to heat up some lentil soup.

And then its on to the next thing!

See The Garden Grow!

 I was teaching class this morning and

we took our usual break for 10 minutes.

I decided to go outside and check the garden.

I haven't been out there in a few days.

Saturday I "double dipped".

Taught both the morning and the evening.

And Sunday I was whipped.

We have tomatoes!!!

These little black beauties take FOREVER 

to get ripe, but when they do, BOY HOWDY!

They are so delicious.

The plants (we bought two little twigs)

are totally taking off!

And we have a strawberry!

And (shhh) nobody has seen it yet!

(usually there's a chomp out of the bottom...)

And dill!!

(But no cucumbers...)

And beans growing in the beds you see in the fore and

backgrounds... LOTS of bean plants this time around!

The rattlesnakes are beginning their journey up (and

eventually OVER) the tunnel.

And the purple potatoes in the background are looking

good and healthy.

We bought a new fertilizer this year and I guess

everybody REALLY liked it!

We're excited for these potatoes!

And...

a random flower.

(And her little sister)

Growing in the middle of the lawn.

So Kyle carefully mows around them.

We think its hilarious!

Full Moon

 Yup, it's a FULL moon,

I just caught a glimpse of it, rising over the trees.

And, of course, when there is a full moon,

people (and animals) act stupid.

Kyle texted me this picture at work yesterday.

Yes, that is a steer.

He is wedged sideways in the alley

leading up to the scales.

He wedged his head (lower left) UNDER the

bottom board on the fence.

And could NOT get out.

(Probably trying to get to the grass 

on the other side... always greener and all that...)

He also has a leg over one of the boards.

And, of course, the boards are screwed in on the

INSIDE of the chute so they can't just

push through them.

But that meant he had to get IN there to remove the

board and free the goof ball.

Luckily BK (Black Kow) is fairly mellow

and super shy so he didn't try to ram into Kyle

once he was free...

(And yes, we closed the gate so this can't 

happen again!)

Oh the joys of farm life.

And a full moon!

LOL

Purple Potatoes

 Last year we grew a bunch of purple potatoes.

But they were kind of tiny.

I put them in the drawer in the pantry fridge.

I rarely open that drawer.

Yup.

I forgot all about them.

(We had mashed purple potatoes a couple of times...)

Anyhow.

Kyle found them the other day and planted them.

And they are coming up!!!!!

He is teeny tiny, but has lots of buddies.

Kyle did two beds.

We are hoping for a bumper crop of

yummy purple potatoes!!!

And yea for okra plants!!!

I did two beds and I'm going to go to the store

today and get more.

The three beds of pintos I planted did NOTHING.

So I'm going to do okra instead.

We are going to experiment with planting them

with LOTS of space around them and see

if I get a better yield from less plants.

(These that are coming up are WAAAAAY too close,

but after the pinto mis-hap I decided to plant heavy

and then we will thin them...)

YEA for "spring".

NANCY!!!

 Today is Nancy's birthday!!!!

If I do the math right

(and I rarely do...)

this is a big one...

We all got together last August to celebrate Dad's big birthday.

Nancy and Reid were both fighting being sick,

so I didn't get to see as much of her as I would have liked,

and we didn't take ANY pictures!!!!!

(I'm so bad at that.)

(I'm heading out again in 2 weeks.

PICTURES! PICTURES! PICTURES!)

Hahahaha.

She'll kill me for this one.

Because she isn't grinning so much as gritting her teeth.

But at least I cropped out the rest!

And here is her partner in "gritting / grinning".

They are so cute!

(And STRONG!!!)

But she is strong in more than just her muscles.

She has amazing strength of character.

She knows what she believes and she lives it.

She knows what she loves and fights for it.

She knows WHO she loves and fights for them.

She knows who SHE is and has finally learned to

fight for herself!!!

She is strong in her beliefs.

She is strong in her love.

She is strong in her family ties.

She is strong in her fight for others.

And yet with all that strength, she has incredible softness.

She finds joy in the simple things each day.

She IS the feathers she so loves.

(And draws so well!)

Soft, pliable, beautiful.

Yet able to lift to greater and greater heights.

And she is my big sister.

I love you Nanc!

Happy Birthday!

Beau Boo Hoo

 Yesterday morning Beau was happy as a clam.

Bouncing around and smiling

and trying to not let me catch him.

(I had to work at the Town and Kyle has a big

job he is doing down in Vero...)

Beau knows when I put on EARRINGS I'm 

probably teaching and he runs and gets in

his special chair in the zoom room.

But if I put on long pants and SHOES and earrings

then I'm going OUT and he's going to have to

go into the garage in his crate.

So it's a dance.

Catch me... catch me....

and then I put on my serious "Lady" voice

and he just goes.

But he has fun pretending he doesn't have to.

When I got home from work, I let him out

into the back to run while I brought my stuff

inside the house. And when he returned I was

pretty sure he had rolled in something dead.

(A fairly common occurrence around here...)

P. U.!!!!!!

But then I realized he didn't roll in something stinky.

HE was the something stinky.

His right ear was red and draining.

And WOW! Stink-meister!

When Kyle got home we cleaned his ear out really well,

and then had to put his "cone of shame" on so he

wouldn't keep scratching.

He "loves" it.

Poor guy.

Trying to drink.

LOL.

Poor guy.

We took it off and let him get a drink.

And then put it on and sent him to his crate.

Cuz WOW!

He was still REALLY stinky.

But when he got up this morning and I took

off his cone, he didn't try to scratch at all,

so I left it off.

This morning I called and got a vet appointment at 9:00.

On the phone they said they would need a urine sample.

???????????????

When we got into the room the tech said

"So he's here today because he has some urine problems?"

Uh, no.

He has an EAR infection.

Ear / urine... ok.

So thankfully no sample needed.

But he does, in fact, have a 

nicely infected ear.

MANY dollars and 5 prescriptions later...

He gets steroid pills as well as antibiotics and 

a pain med, an ointment and an ear flush

for 21 days.

(I accidentally typed years... lol!)

He took his pills like a good boy.

(Wrapped in peanut butter)

(sometimes its a good thing he doesn't chew

he just swallows the good stuff whole.)

And now he is sleeping in his special chair.

Poor guy.

Stake Primary Activity

 It went well.

People seemed to have a good time.

The kids made LOTS of noise,

which is usually a sign of having fun.

(grin)

This was our poster in the foyer.

And then there were little rainbow

signs with arrows showing the way

to the correct door in the cultural hall.

I forgot to take ANY pictures.

So these are all from others...

Once they arrived in the cultural hall,

we had the 5 missionaries helping them

by writing their name on a name tag

and sticking it on their shirts.

I made 100 name tags, each with a colored

puffy sticker animal.

4 colors.

4 groups.

4 rooms.

Once everyone had a name tag we had them

break into their color coded groups and

follow their color coded leader.

(I was the "green" leader / room.)

There were signs on the rooms we were using

with Room 1, 2, 3 or 4.

In one room they were to build an ark

and they talked about things you could put

in your ark that would help you or harm you.

(reading scripture, going to Primary, telling lies... etc.)

I had LOTS of left over little stickers so they

covered their sails with stickers and decorative tape.

I was the next room where we talked about being Noah,

but mostly about being Noah's KIDS.

(Ham, Shem and Japheth - a VERY fun name to say...)

We talked about what it would be like to build 

the ark while all your friends and neighbors were

teasing and bullying.

And then filling it with food.

And then living with all those animals!!!

Their favorite part was when I had them each pick

an animal and its sound and then I let them all

make their animal sound TOGETHER for a few seconds.

WOW!

It was noisy!

I was amazed at the insight these kids had.

For example:

Why didn't the lions eat the rabbits?

In each group at least one kid came up with

"I think Heavenly Father made them be friends."

or some variation on that theme.

We only spent 15 minutes in each room and then

they switched and we got a new colored group, so there

wasn't enough time to do all the stuff I wanted.

I brought a prism to show them how it makes

a rainbow but only showed it to one group because

one of the boys knew I had it and asked about it.

The next room was a "Bug" room where they

did something relating to bugs.

(grin)

I have NO idea what they did, but it

had to do with a big bag of plastic bugs I bought

and they pulled one out of a bag and then...

did something with it...

And finally we had the missionaries in a room

where they did the fishing game with poles and

magnets and fish with paper clips and they

caught a fish and there was a challenge on it...

but again, I wasn't involved so no idea what they did.

When we had done all 4 of the rooms 

(repeat 4 times.... each time was DIFFERENT

depending on the age group, and how they

responded...)

we fed them lunch.

Thankfully the Primary Presidency from one of the wards

was BRILLIANT and took over the actual distribution

of the lunches - they had the line thread in one door and

out the other through the bug room (set up kind of like

a museum) and then back in another door and out the

other while passing by the kitchen window to get

their sandwich, bag of chips, cookie and bottle of water.

As they passed down the hall back to the cultural hall,

there was a station to add tomatoes or lettuce to

your plate and small condiment packets.

And someone else had re-set the chairs into long,

snaking lines that sort of made groups without being a group.

Like giant "S" that looped around the end. So everyone

was together but not.

The kids mostly sat on the floor (wood) and the parents

sat on the chairs and based on the noise level

everyone had a good time.

When the kids were done eating, we had little 

tables set up around the edges with memory games

and pages to color (and crayons) and some little

tube things to crawl through (used in the bug room

originally... no idea why/how...)

And then they left.

And we cleaned up.

(with lots of help)

And then I took a nap.

Lots of positive feed-back afterwards and on

Sunday - lots wanting to know when we were

going to do it AGAIN!

(Next March????? lol)

SPRING Beans!

 Remember this?

I was so excited the beans were coming up.

And then realized you couldn't see them...

But NOW!!!!

Look at them all!

So exciting!

I just finished teaching my Friday morning class,

and now I need to go get ready for our

Stake Primary Activity tomorrow.

Yes, get ready.

Like, no, it's NOT ready.

I have ordered some stuff

and thought a bit (ok, until 2:00 last night,

laying in bed imagining what I would say / do...)

but I am NOT ready....

Anyhow.

I need to get name tags ready.

And organize the memory game.

And print coloring papers.

And buy crayons.

And probably some other stuff.

Fingers crossed.

Me. And a LOT of little kids.

Not my very best situation.

It'll be fine.

But I'm nervous / not excited.

The theme is "Gather Like Noah" and I will

be focusing on "doing hard things".

Like a Stake Primary Activity...

hahahahahahahaha

Reach For The Stars

 Do you remember the lovely bonus

I got earlier this year that helped

us be able to afford our freeze dryer?

I got this in the mail yesterday.

A banner to hang in my "classroom"

to let all the world know I was the

#1 Licensing Coach in Florida

for 2021!

Pretty nifty!

And this morning someone else was

reaching for the stars...

I never get tired of watching rockets launch from the Cape!

Baby Beans

 It's so fun when the garden starts to grow!!!

The rattlesnake beans I planted last week

are all coming up!

I was a little nervous because these

are seeds we saved!

So we didn't even have to buy them!

The slenderettes are just starting to pop up.

They will be bigger and more

bean-ish tomorrow,

but I was excited to see them.

These are left over seeds from last year.

Then I expect in the next few days the

pintos and black eyed peas will begin

to make their presence known.

I planted three more beds of pintos today.

That's about all I can do in one session.

My back hurts too bad if I do too many more.

I still have 2 more beds to put  .... 

probably more black eyed peas.

I think I'm pretty well out of pinto seeds.

And then there are 2 beds for okra

and 2 for purple potatoes.

And that will be IT!

(Well, until the strawberries we ordered

arrive - along with some raspberry canes...)

Spring is sprung-ing...!

YEA!